


Amours me fait desirer

by gnostic_heretic



Category: Hetalia: Axis Powers
Genre: (calling myself out lmao), 19th Century, Character Study, Decapitation, Enemies to Friends to Lovers, F/F, French Revolution, Friends to Enemies, Historical, Historical Hetalia, Historical Inaccuracy, Implied/Referenced Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Major Character Undeath, Middle Ages, Modern Era, Multiple Pairings, Name Changes, Nationverse, World War II, power lesbian France through the ages
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-09-17
Updated: 2018-09-17
Packaged: 2019-07-13 15:54:01
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,162
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16021160
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/gnostic_heretic/pseuds/gnostic_heretic
Summary: “Alice, do you ever feel bored?”“What kind of question is that? Of course I do. We all do.”“No, I don’t mean bored as in, not knowing what TV show you should watch, not being in the mood to walk your dog. I mean, tired. I feel like I’ve lived too long.”“That’s ‘cause you have.” Alice gulps, she pointedly stares at her empty cup. “We both have.”





	Amours me fait desirer

**Author's Note:**

> Different episodes about Nyo!France and everyone relevant in her life, throughout history.  
> Mainly FrUk.  
> (Premise: I don't claim for this to be 100% historically accurate. Please don't call me out on historical accuracy- this is a fanfiction, and I try my very best, but I don't want to lose my sanity to get every single detail right!)

 

Amours me fait desirer  
Et amer  
De cuer si folettement  
Que je ne puis esperer  
Ne penser  
N'ymaginer nullement  
Que le dous viaire gent  
Qui m'esprent  
Me doie joie donner,  
S'amours ne fait proprement  
Telement  
Que je l'aie sans rouver.

_-Guillaume de Machaut_

 

* * *

 

“I’ll show you my garden of delights, my dear, and you will love it as much as I do. I am sure.”

Clodoswinthe took the princess’ hand and guided her in the small garden inside her castle (one of the many, truth to be told), and her new friend’s mouth dropped open as soon as she stepped in.  
She didn’t say anything.

“You’re speechless, aren’t you? You’ve never seen anything like this, right?”

She giggled and pulled her forward, towards her favorite part of the place: a bush of roses, some in full bloom, some still buds, ready to blossom soon.  
Clodoswinthe looked at her guest, and she thought she was like one of those buds: sure, still small and with the face and body of a child. But soon she would become a woman grown, a beautiful rose like herself, and Clodoswinthe wanted to be there for all of it. To teach her about love, and courtesies, and share all of her beauty secrets.

Yes, she knew that the girl would grow up soon; while the rise of the house of Wessex was not nearly as magnificent or glorious as the rise of Charlemagne, for sure… it was also the prelude of something bigger, Clodoswinthe could feel it.  
In the meanwhile, she had decided to offer the princess her hospitality, as it was the right thing to do. After all, just like her, she came from, and for proud, resilient people: the soul of the Anglo-Saxons pumped into her veins as much as the heart of the Frankish people beat with her own.

(And Clodoswinthe could never forget the date she was born, amidst war and instability, on the day king Clovis converted to the One, True Faith. The people said it was a good omen, and as they noticed her neverending youth, they said she, herself, was a good omen for the kingdom. An angel on Earth.)

The birds sang around them, the sky was blue and clear. The perfect spring morning.

“So dear, what is your name again?”

“Æthelswith.”

“Can I call you Ethel? Your name is very long.”

Clodoswinthe smiled, bright as a star.

“I don’t know, ma’am. Clodoswinthe is a long name too. Can I call you Swine?”

Clodoswinthe frowned, dark as a storm.

“Listen, _you_. You are a guest in my house.”

“I’m a prisoner in a stupid little garden o’ flowers, as if it makes a cell any less dark. I’m a way to ensure the friendship of my house, and you a condescending prick.”

“I’m tied by blood to the Holy Empire. You will respect me, miss!”

“I’m tied to the land of Wyverns, Milady. And you’re nothing but a princess in a tower, aye. All happy ‘cause her prison has roses and daisies. You better respect me, lady, or you will anger my king.”

 

Ethel walked back inside, her roughspun white gown stained by the grass of the garden.

“ _Puterelle_ ”, Clodoswinthe hissed between her teeth, nervously playing with one of her perfect golden curls.

 

She kicked the rose bush next to her, angry and frustrated.  
How dare this Saxon wench disrespect her? Did she really think she could measure up?  
Clodoswinthe looked at the petals falling, caught in the tangle of wood and thorns, and thought about her stupid, brutish face again.

Thick and dark eyebrows, hair as straight and dry and yellow as straw, and a ridiculous upturned pig nose. Her face was as common as her blood probably was, the _fille de bas of Wessex_.

Clodoswinthe looked at the petals falling, and at her feet noticed a pansy.

* * *

 

“A few more years, and my sister’s tyranny will fall,” Deirdre said, staring intensely out of the stained glass windows. “There’s too much instability, too much bloodshed. The people will not like a queen if there’s hunger in the streets, in the country.”

“But dear, will they like a queen they’ve never seen?”

“They will, if she defends the one, true faith. The court might have had a fistful of protestant books and ideas hammered into their empty heads, yes. But the common people are with us. They’re with _Mary_. Not with Elizabeth. Not with Alice.”

 _Alice_.

Clodoswinthe had become accustomed to the name, as of lately: she had almost forgotten what England’s name used to be before that, before she had changed it.  
She had thought about changing her own name quite a few times, but each time she looked at her kingdom’s family tree, the idea of changing her name to something more conventional (like Marie, or Marguerite) left her heart feeling raw and bleeding.

And Deirdre, her best friend, her _lover_ , the kingdom of Scotland, loved to remind her that her name had a proud history. It was not easy to wear, like the most precious crown, golden and sparkling with gems. Turning a few heads was to be expected, and even appreciated.

Scotland was wise, and despite her youthful appearance, had a history as long as France’s own had been. With a hand she touched the window, as if to reach outside for her faraway land– a journey that could only be a dream, at least now.  
Deirdre’s hands had never been slender or feminine, but she liked them all the same, the gentle caresses on Clodoswinthe’s cheeks made her feel safe, loved, protected. She filled her thoughts, her heart, her entire being.

Deirdre, whose fiery red hair was speckled gold by the light of the sun, filtering through the golden lilies of delicate glass.

Whose freckles looked like stars in the night sky, as the blue of the French coat of arms colored her face.

 

So often, Clodoswinthe had a hard time believing that she and England were actually sisters. Not by blood, not fully sisters, but she was told that the relation was there: in the heart of their lands, of their people and kings. Or queens, like now.  
Deirdre’s face was strong, her gaze hard as stone.  
With the passing of years, decades after decades, Alice had somewhat grown accustomed to the way of the court. Clodoswinthe wouldn’t call her a proper _dame_ , no: she would never be a rose, she thought with a smile. _Always a pansy_.

That day she had worn blue velvet, and Alice a white wool dress.

That night, she had sang about knights and queens to her, and Alice told her that she sounded stupid, and adulterers should be put to death.

 

_How funny, how soon she would come to fall in love with love, with the stories of her own land, of Lancelot and Guinevere, of Morgan le Fay and Tristan and Iseult. Only her own, though._

_Not like any of this mattered: the age of courtship and poems and songs was over, now it was war and venom and hatred that occupied men’s hearts, not love. The fair lady was coin and gold; the noble heart was drawn to conquer, not God._

 

The last time she had seen Alice, years before, when her king came to visit with young princess Mary, and everyone drank and feasted ( _not knowing that the fall was so close, oh so close, as it had always been_ ), she was surprised at how far she had come.

Britain was an island of contrasts, that much Clodoswinthe could say.

Alice had a polite coldness to her, and when she noted it, she said that wits are often a woman’s best weapon. Her tongue was sharp, sharp as a sword.  
When she had told Deirdre that, she had laughed in her face.

“Horseshit, I say. A woman’s best weapon is a blade, the heaviest and sharpest the better, darling. Those are the words of a weakling who can’t wield one, that England. Let’s see what theatre does to her when the time for war comes.  
She’ll recite comedies, and I’ll slay her with my sword. A woman’s best weapon.”

 

_Clodoswinthe had felt a little sad, for she had never been taught how to wield a sword either._

_“Beauty is a woman’s best weapon,” her godmother always told her, and deep down she still thought there was some truth to it._

_Beauty was her best weapon, and Deirdre with her sword had fallen to her feet, kneeling before her. Hatred occupied men’s hearts in times of war, yes: but red-blooded Deirdre was no man, and there was plenty of place for love in her heart._

 

* * *

 

 

It was among the rosy and coy notes of a bourée that she spotted her on the other side of the room, standing still and protected by a swirling, dancing whirlwind of bodies and silks and wigs.  
She wanted to talk to her, but it would be so awkward, she thought: how long had it been since she had last spoken to her?

 

 _The last letter I sent_ , she remembered, _was the one about Deirdre’s death. Calling her a treacherous murderer. Murderer of your own sister, if not by blood, in name and spirit._

 

She couldn’t help but notice how much she had grown, this time not just in manners. England’s body looked small as always, she had not lost the small, petite frame she had always had, even as a girl.  
But she was a woman now, with a woman’s charms. France had noticed the subtle touch of pink on her cheeks, and the glow in her green eyes.

_The eyebrows hadn’t changed, though._

She noticed the way she looked at a certain young man in the room: and for some reason she felt _jealousy_ , not of the romantic kind, of course not.  
It was childish of her, maybe, definitely–   _definitely_ , yes, she felt as if time has never passed, she felt robbed of the girl she once was offered as a friend by her king, when she had been just a maiden, and England a child. She wondered how things could have gone differently.

Could they have been friends, for real?

_Would Deirdre still be alive?_

 

 

How stupid was it of her, really? It seemed like in the end, the powerful kingdom of France was the one who always ended up chasing after a country that started as a bit of land on an inhospitable, cold, humid island.

Absorbed by her own thoughts, she suddenly felt someone tugging at her sleeve.  
A familiar face looked up at her, and she gasped.

“Swine? You look troubled.”

“ _Ugh_ , don’t call me that, please. We’re at an important gathering. I am _France_.”

“France. If by important gathering, you mean the king and queen’s deplorable descent into decadence, you’re right. I’m so lucky to witness this. Is that his lover, the lady on the king’s knees?”

“ _Quiet_ ,” France hissed, “or she’ll have you executed, and I’ll eat _brioche_ as I watch your head fall.”

 

 

 

 _Executed_.

 

A heavy word, with heavy implications. Heavy memories and faults.

 

_Did you watch the blood of Scotland spill on the ground, England? Did you watch your sister die, her head fall, and did you have a bite of pork pie as you did?_

 

France’s face grew pale, and it wasn’t the powder, _non_.

 

“All this perfume’s making me feel ill, France. Wanna join me on the terrace? You look like you could use some fresh air, too.”

She followed England out of the room. “It’s probably my new corset. It’s so tight.”

 

On the terrace, they sat in silence, watching the moon reflecting on the fountains of the garden. England seemed less than impressed by the water tricks, and France had to agree, when she thought about it for a moment, that they were nothing but frivolous.

“So how’s young America? I’ve heard all sorts of stories about her, recently. All of France’s salons won’t stop talking about your colonies, England.”

“Might be, I admit she’s a good resource. Growing really fast, too…”

England bit her thumb and her silken glove.

“Worried about the growth?”

“Bloody hell, France, of course I am. You know what _that_ means.”

Of course, France knew what that meant. The fact that her colony had produced a Nation was already enough of a reason to worry.

“Look at the positive side, England. You’re powerful as ever, and yet you haven’t grown an inch since I met you.”

“ _That’s a fucking lie!_ ”

“Shh, don’t raise your voice! You’re all flushed, and red doesn’t fit your complexion, _chérie_. Just makes your face look more homely than it already does.”

England huffed, and gulped. “Just like that stupid smirk o’ yours makes you look even more like a town whore than you already do. It’s the dress that really does the trick, though. It really compliments your tits.”

France’s jaw dropped, and then she laughed. A small, polite laughter, as it would suit a _dame_.

“You think this shows too much?”

She inched closer to her, chest forward, and saw her face reddening even more, until England was stuttering nonsense in her atrocious language. “Seems like you like it though, don’t you? Must be sad to not have something to show of your own. A woman’s beauty is her best weapon, England, and your army is lacking...”

France left a chaste kiss on England’s cheeks, and decided to retire to her chambers. The night was still young, and yet, she had never felt so old: the weight of centuries on her shoulders, pushing her down.

Plus, her hairstyle was coming undone and her powder growing thin.

She had almost reached the corridor when she heard a voice calling.

“–ce! _France_!”

She turned her head and saw England behind her, red and huffing, her hair also coming undone, holding her skirt up in a very ungraceful way. “France,” she said, “first off, fuck you.”

 _Ah, that’s so like her._ “Got it.”

“Secondly,” England wheezed, “you’re a coward, and wrong. You might have a pretty face, and… a shapely body, that much I’ll say. Pretty hair, gorgeous eyes, you name it. You have it all. By looking at you, one could almost say you shit rubies and pearls. But what you lack is a _brain_ , France. In war and love, it’s intelligence that you need, and knowledge. Beauty will only serve you so far.”

“In love?” France gave her a hemlock look and a smile just as venomous. “And what do you suppose you can teach me about love, _Angleterre_?”

England’s smile and pose showed a kind of bravado that France didn’t know she could have.

“Allow me into your chambers, _Mademoiselle_ , and I will show you.”

* * *

 

France opened her eyes, aching and broken from her head to her toes, and initially she could feel nothing but stone and pain: hard and cold below her, raw and burning inside her body.

When she could finally see, it was chaos, destruction, and death, and all around her the revolution had claimed all, and nothing was left.

She was laying next to a pile of bodies, similarly scattered on the ground. The daily price to pay for freedom, for a brave new world. A world that would wipe away the old.

All that she had been, all that she had known.

All was red.

The blood spilled, the guts splattered on the cobblestones. It was ironic how Paris looked the same as it always had, with the same buildings and streets, and the same sky.

If you want everything to stay the same, you need to change everything.

 

When she looked up, she felt as if she had born again, and she could almost forget.

_Forget France and Nations, forget her essence and mission._

_Just a woman, laying on the ground, bleeding red as everyone else._

Blue sky and the white clouds floating, the gates of heaven had always been there.

If only had she remembered to look up.

_Forget the Kings and Queens and God she had always known._

Screw that, screw this.

 

Was this the end of France?

 

She wondered.

 

 

 

And yet, she was still alive.

 

The people around her were raising a flag, blue and white and red.

 

And even with her dress ripped, even with the blood running down her open chest and cracked ribs, France stood up, taking the banner from a boy nearby.

She saw the pile of corpses next to her: the nobles she had once known and loved, familiar faces and bodies.

 

_Was this a good cause?_

 

_Was this righteous?_

 

She did not know, and yet, it all came so easy: she raised the flag, and stood.

 

 

No, it was not the end of France: the people had spoken, they had _screamed_ , and she had been too deaf to hear it. Until now.

 

“Whoa, she’s still _alive_?”

“ _Stab her again_! No compassion for those leeches!”

The young and old man spoke, but before they could even touch her, she proclaimed her immortal nature, plain for everyone to see.

“ _I am the Nation of France! Citizens, follow me!_ ”

A loud chattering of whispers rose in the crowd, now gathered around her.

“Touch the wound on my ribs, if you do not believe! Feel my hands: my body is still cold, but I am reborn from my ashes. I have heard the will of my people. And I will stand by you. I will remember your names!”

A woman came forward, bearing a musket in her arms.  
_A woman’s best weapon is a sword_ , Deirdre had said; _but a gun is just as good_ , France added in her mind..

“I am Charlotte. Charlotte Tarbé. Remember my name!”

France smiled, and took her hand. Charlotte’s hand was warm, and her face caked with dirt, and her strong scent of gunpowder, ah, she seemed so extremely beautiful in that moment.

“Charlotte.

I am _Marianne_. Remember my name.”

 

* * *

 

What is the court if not a glittering glimpse of glamour, a vanity fair of superficial talks and concerns? Just when she thought she had left it all behind, Marianne found herself in the mayhem once again among the shining halls of the Winter Palace.

How adequate of a name, too! The cold permeated every wall, every tile.

 

_And how convenient to have Anya Braginskaya’s warm, soft arms around her waist every morning, the perfume of her hair filling the bed, the room, her lungs._

 

When she looked at her with those big puppy eyes, Marianne couldn’t resist the temptation. An innocent soul, little big Anya, a tall and broad woman with the heart of a child.  
She came to her like clay, like marble ready to be sculpted; and like the finest of artists, she made her into a lady, a diamond.  
Anya was the innocent girl that England had never been, back in the rose garden, centuries before. She was her creature, and France the sweet Prometheus bringing the fire of love into her heart.

  
(Or not, maybe: she had noticed the way Anya looked at one of her subordinates, the doting look in her eyes. But life was a novel, and this was Marianne’s adventure, her romantic conquest and prize.)

 

The dresses, the dances, the small talk with the social elite… she was tired, tired of it all.

She knew that the alliance would not last long. She could smell war in the air, and had a feeling that the stench would only get stronger with the years.

And yet, she let herself go, abandoned to pleasure and to her lazy afternoons with Russia, her funny accent and stuttering French, her love for books and her subtle desire to have a tempestuous romance of her own.

Marianne was there to smile, and to make her smile.

She was there to warm her heart, with this little wicked play in the snowy days of Saint Petersburg.

 

* * *

 

_A bottle of gin, open and almost empty, just a few drops of it left inside._

 

_Letters, papers, ink spilt across the table, fragments of a journal unfinished._

 

 

_Deirdre’s hair, so red, her face, so red, her limbs sprawled on the floor, her neck twisted and wrong, so wrong._

 

 

Marianne had left the apartment with a cold heart, with ugly tears wetting her cheeks, the damp heavy feeling wearing her down.

Strands of blond hair stuck to her face, her perfect _chignon_ undone under the hat of her uniform.

 

_It was wrong. It was all wrong._

 

She wanted to be greeted by her smile, her strong embraces, her genuine laughter and rough kisses and sweet disposition.

 

_England had warned her, but she didn't want to listen._

 

But all they had, her and Marianne, was a broken heart and a shattered story, a turn in the plot that she had never asked for.

Slowly, carefully, she adjusted her expression, wiped her tears.

Outside the squalid apartment in London, the world was at war. And England was waiting for her.

 

* * *

 

 

The air is chilly and the weather gloomy, and Marianne smiles when the waiter brings her a steaming cup of hot chocolate. From the window next to her seat she spots Alice in the crowd, crossing the road and approaching the café.

She enters with a ring and a gust of cold air from the front door, and Marianne waves, receiving only a scowl in response.

_That’s so like England._

“Hello, Alice. How has your day been?”

“Ah, terrible, at least until now. I need some caffeine in my system.”

She calls the waiter to order an espresso, and Marianne observes her familiar movements.

Alice adjusts her ponytail, messed up by the wind outside, with her small and bony hands cracked by the cold. The way she exposes the nape of her neck makes Marianne’s own lips go dry for a moment.

They talk for a while, about things that don’t matter: work and politics and courtesies.

 

Alice orders another coffee after the first one, and another after the second.

Marianne has barely touched her hot chocolate, now as lukewarm as her tepid mood.

 

She takes a sip, and tries to focus on the ongoing conversation to the best of her ability.

She wonders if the boredom she feels will soon go away.  

 

Looking at the woman in front of her, the one she once desired madly and often hated just as madly, the one that had always been the fixed point in her thoughts (in many ways, for sure) she can feel absolutely nothing. Alice talks to her about her sisters and the problems she has with them, she’s abrasive, sarcastic, but calm. Her lips move, her voice is a distant echo. Words, words, words. _Ennui_ .  
The prospect of spending the rest of the day together, holding hands like any other couple in Oxford street… looking into the glittering displays, buying yet another gift for Alice that she knew she would never wear, anyway.

 

Some say that it is distance that makes people grow apart, but France feels like there’s not enough warnings about what being close can do to a couple.

Across the sea, among the war, in the heat of a fight, England is the steady presence in her thoughts, an obsession that never wears out.

Across the table, she’s just another young woman she knows, plain and ordinary.

 

“Alice, do you ever feel bored?”

“What kind of question is that? Of course I do. We all do.”

“No, I don’t mean bored as in, not knowing what TV show you should watch, not being in the mood to walk your dog. I mean, tired. I feel like I’ve lived too long.”

“That’s ‘cause you have.” Alice gulps, she pointedly stares at her empty cup. “We both have.”

Marianne sighs, and finishes her cup of hot chocolate in just one gulp.

England’s silence fills the room, harmonized by the chattering of strangers, humans around them.

“So,” Alice says suddenly, “you wanna go for a walk after this?”

“I don’t know, _chérie_. My plane leaves tonight.”

“Screw the plane. You’re spending the night at my place, and tomorrow…”

England hesitates, and starts biting her nails, as she has always done. Old habits die hard.

“Marianne, tomorrow I’m having lunch with my sisters. I think Deirdre would be glad to see you again. She has gotten so much better, you know.”

France smiles bright, bright as a star.

_This is bound to be an interesting lunch, I can tell._

“ _Très bien_. A walk to Oxford Circus? I desperately need new shoes.”

England smiles back at her. “You know you don’t.”

“But how else am I supposed to cure my _ennui_ , pray tell?”

They pay for their drinks and walk out of the café, and England immediately clings to France’s arm to cross the street.

 

Alice is so close that Marianne can smell her shampoo, a delicate flowery fragrance.

She looks down to meet her girlfriend’s eyes, and notices that the collar of her shirt is embroidered with red and white roses.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading so far, I hope everyone who did enjoyed the journey! ;u; Please let me know if you have any feedback or comment to share, I'd be so happy to hear about it!


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